On Christmas Day after the church bbq, we went to Frenchman's Lodge, a nursing home for the elderly to spread some Christmas cheer to the elderly by singing some carols and giving them some presents we have prepared for them.
At first I was quite casual about it. I was even mentioning it to Stephanie at the office that I will be going to a nursing home to sing some carols and she was like all wow and starry-eyed to me about the 'great deed' I am doing.
Well, the caroling part is easy. We stood in a line and sang. Derrick was a real good spot and walked around clapping his hands and engaging the elderly to sing along. And after the singing, the rest of my church mates went around distributing the presents and smiling and mingled with the residents. They sat with them and chatted and took lots of pictures with Ernest being the official photographer of the day (of course).
And I? I went out to the grounds and sat at the wooden bench in the shade from the scorching sun.
I simply could not bring myself to sit with an old person and pretend to small talk. I did try. I took one present and gave it to the nicest looking old lady and sat beside her. I asked how her day was and she smiled and said thank you for coming. I told her if she wants to unwrap the present and she said it is ok, she wants to keep it until she can unwrap it herself in her room when we all leave. That will give her something to do to pass the time. By this comment, I felt real anxious and suddenly is tongue-tied.
I have never stayed with an older person before in my home. I do not know what to say and how to make them laugh. Old people always give me the creeps that they are just waiting to die, minute by minute. About 15mins ago, I just arrived at the Lodge and asked to go to the Ladies. Just outside the ladies, I witnessed an old man in a wheelchair scolded by one of the nurse in attendance. I am not sure for what but I just winced cos it is plain wrong to scold old people like that no matter what they have done.
To me, a nursing home is a farce. The old people do not want to be there because they are sent there by their children who could not care enough or maybe they have no where to go except to go to a nursing home. The nurses are overworked and perhaps were at the end of their nice-ness to treat the old people nicely. I feel depressed already.
Added to that, pastor also mentioned that perhaps the highlight of their Christmas Day is us coming to sing carols to them. How sad is that? It made me so uncomfortable. You may say I am heartless and is a coward but I really cannot face these poor old people and I had to escape. I waited until my church mates finished chatting to the old people and when pastor rounded up everyone to go home do I ventured out to the gates to wait for them.
I told Ernest I was waiting for everyone outside and I am glad he did not judged me. He merely asked me why I didn't talk to them to see how easy it is to talk to old people. I told him why. He said he understood.
When Ernest joined the Elderly Ministry a few years back when we were still in Singapore, he had to devote every Sat to do house visits at TPY's one-room HDB flats to do cleaning and visitations to the old people together with his team. Then they will invite them to the Hokkien church service at the church with transport provided. He told me before most of the flats had that 'old people' smell and most of them stank because it is hard for them to do housework due to old age or handicaps. They had to do the housework for the elderly.
Then on Sun, he sometimes had to do transport duty where he might be required to lift handicapped old people up the bus, keep their wheel chairs, lift them down the bus, to the services and repeat the procedure for the journey back home.
I asked him why he can do this week after week. He told me it may be easy to fake for a session of caroling to the old people, but you really got to have the patience and the love for them to do this week after week. He said somehow he have this calling to this ministry and he enjoyed it alot.
And this trip to the nursing home bring back alot of memories for him. He wants to design a nice postcard of all the photos he took of the old people and will print them out on good paper to send to all the new friends he has made at the nursing home.I nearly teared at what he told me.
I understood then everyone has their calling in life. Mine is definitely not with old people. I am uncomfortable with them. But I am strong in other things. I feel a bit guilty though, like I have not done enough that day at the nursing home. But I rather stand aside in respect than to fake it. After that talk with Ernest, I felt more assured. Maybe the next time an opportunity like this arise again, I might say no, cos I know I cannot contribute much. Ah ha, I know. I can wrap the presents for old people. Or prepare the carol songs.
No comments:
Post a Comment